


Late Nights and Bare Bottoms

by Shi_Toyu



Series: Stark Week 2017 [13]
Category: Captain America - All Media Types, Iron Man - All Media Types, The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Aprons, Baking, Bucky Barnes Recovering, Feeding, Insomnia, M/M, Multiple Personalities, Nudity, OT3, Prompt Fill, Public Nudity, Tony Being Tony, Tony Stark Has A Heart, Winter Beng Adorable
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-12
Updated: 2017-08-12
Packaged: 2018-12-14 10:55:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,947
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11781696
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Shi_Toyu/pseuds/Shi_Toyu
Summary: Tony stared down at the gingerbread cookies that’d been placed on the edge of the work station. It’d been the smell that’d drawn him out of his tunnel vision. He didn’t normally smell gingerbread in the middle of August. He blinked hazily, but the plate of cookies didn’t disappear. They were still warm, too, when he picked one up and bit into it.God, and delicious. He moaned and stuffed the rest of the cookie into his mouth, already reaching for another one.“You like them.”Tony nearly jumped out of his skin at the sound of Bucky’s voice, but in a flat tone. The super soldier loomed behind his chair, hair a tangled mess and face completely blank. He was dressed in Clint’s ‘I love to rub my meat’ apron and what appeared to be nothing else.“Uhhh… yes?”





	Late Nights and Bare Bottoms

**Author's Note:**

  * For [rinsachi](https://archiveofourown.org/users/rinsachi/gifts).



> Based on this prompt from the lovely Rinsachi: “We're baking and promptly my brain supplies me with a new headcanon so imagine James is back and all and he is James and maybe he is with Tony already maybe he is still courting him. Anyway at night WINTER gets up to bake Tony cakes and stuff because Tony loves them and winter after all loves seeing Tony happy and well fed and taking care of. So he bakes. But since James sleeps naked and Winter doesn't care, Winter bakes naked with an apron (and boy I have so many ideas what kind of that could be!). And now imagine Steve can't sleep in the middle of the night and comes into the kitchen and Winter glaring at him! Oh gosh...and best if no one knew and oh god”

Tony stared down at the gingerbread cookies that’d been placed on the edge of the work station. It’d been the smell that’d drawn him out of his tunnel vision. He didn’t normally smell gingerbread in the middle of August. He blinked hazily, but the plate of cookies didn’t disappear. They were still warm, too, when he picked one up and bit into it.

God, and _delicious_. He moaned and stuffed the rest of the cookie into his mouth, already reaching for another one.

“You like them.”

Tony nearly jumped out of his skin at the sound of Bucky’s voice, but in a flat tone. The super soldier loomed behind his chair, hair a tangled mess and face completely blank. He was dressed in Clint’s ‘I love to rub my meat’ apron and what appeared to be nothing else.

“Uhhh… yes?”

He was pretty extra sure he’d missed something, but the super soldier only gave a sharp nod, turned on his heel, and headed for the door. Tony ate another cookie while he watched the man’s bare buns disappear into the elevator.

Welp. That’d just happened.

.

Bucky, Tony quickly figured out, wasn’t actually Bucky when he came by bare and bearing baked goods. Apparently, Winter liked to get up in the middle of the night and go on kitchen adventures and since Bucky slept in the nude… The ex-assassin had come down to Tony’s lab the next day to apologize, utterly mortified. Tony had laughed it off and asked if Winter took requests because he was craving some fruitcake now that he’d polished off the plate of gingerbread cookies.

Two nights later he woke up to Winter standing over his bed, fruitcake in hand, and wearing Natasha’s apron proclaiming ‘The last time I cooked, hardly anyone died’… It still had the tags on it.

.

After that, it just kept on happening. After gaining the first five pounds, Tony started bringing the baked goods down to the R&D breakroom so he wasn’t stuck eating it all himself. (Not that he didn’t _want_ to. He just also wanted to still be able to fit in the Iron Man armor.) It really raised morale down there, which was a plus. Of course, Tony usually went out of his way to make sure his R &D team stayed happy. The only one who didn’t seem happy with the new arrangement was Winter.

He kept frowning at Tony when he’d only eat a single cookie, piece of cake or candy. Then he started making _extra_ of everything, like maybe Tony was worried he was taking too much and would take more if he thought there was enough. It was starting to make Tony feel downright guilty.

“Look, I really appreciate it,” he finally broke under the pressure and confessed, “but diabetes wouldn’t be a very good look on me, I’m pretty sure.”

Winter’s eyebrows pulled together just a fraction and it should have been illegal how hurt it made him look. He was practically pouting. He held the tray out a bit closer to Tony, three pies sitting atop it. He was in Steve’s apron today, which was a frilly rendition of his Captain America uniform and had been a gift from Tony himself. It made Tony a bit uncomfortable to see Winter in it and nothing else.

“It’s blackberry,” Winter said, maybe even a bit hopefully.

Tony stared. Blackberry was his favorite.

“Fine,” he sighed, shifting forward on the couch and gesturing toward the coffee table. “I guess I’m just doomed, then.”

Winter grinned widely.

.

“Dude. What the fuck?”

Tony shuffled around in the cramped vents so he could actually see Clint.

“Not so loud,” he shushed him. “I’m hiding from Winter.”

The archer stared at him.

“This is my turf. You can’t have it.”

“And it’s _my_ tower. Look, it’s just for a couple of hours.”

Clint huffed, but seemed to accept the inevitable even if he wasn’t happy about it.

“Why are you hiding from Winter anyway? The guy freaking adores you, creepy as that is.”

Tony shot him a glare.

“I’m quite adorable, I’ll have you know. Winter just… If he finds me, he’ll try to _feed_ me.”

“You mean the whole baking thing?” Clint asked, nose scrunching up. “Can’t you just say no?”

Tony groaned.

“I wish! But every time I do he gets this _look_ and it makes me feel so guilty I end up eating until I feel sick from all the sugar. I can’t take it anymore!”

“Have you considered talking to Bucky about it?”

Tony shot him a disbelieving look.

“Are you kidding me? The poor guy wanted to crawl in a hole and die when all this started. I don’t want to make this whole thing any more embarrassing for him.”

There was a beat of silence and then Clint sighed in a decidedly put-upon manner.

“And yet he still doesn’t wear any pants to bed. You’d think that’d tell you something.”

.

Despite his usual resolution never to take any advice from Clint, after a couple of nights spent in the ventilation shafts of the tower Tony decided it might not actually be such a bad plan to talk to Bucky. Yeah, things might get a bit awkward, but Tony wasn’t as young as he used to be. His back needed an actual bed to sleep in. Besides, Winter was bound to track down where he’d been sneaking off to eventually, even if JARVIS had been forbidden from telling him.

“Hey, Buckaroo,” he greeted as he entered the gym where Bucky was doing weight lifting. “How’s it going?”

The barbell crashed to the ground as Bucky whipped around.

“Tony! Where have you been?”

He beelined across the gym toward the genius. His eagerness was a bit off, since they didn’t exactly hang out. Tony supposed they always _saw_ each other, though, and were in the same spaces a lot and he _had_ been ‘gone’ a couple days.

“Oh, you know,” he hedged, “around. Listen, I was hoping we could talk. Have you got a minute? I don’t want to interrupt your,” he waved a hand in the directed of the abandoned weights, “self-inflicted torture routine.”

Bucky rolled his eyes, some of the tension Tony hadn’t even realized was in his shoulders draining away.

“It’s called a workout,” he deadpanned.

“Yeah, yeah. Do you have a minute or not?”

“I think I can find one to spare, considering you’ve gone through the trouble of gracing me with your illustrious presence.”

Tony ignored his sarcastic tone in favor of preening.

“Well, I’m glad at least _someone_ around here appreciates me,” he said smugly, barreling on before Bucky could make another smartass comment and derail his line of thought. “Other than Winter, of course. Which is actually who I came down here to talk to you about.”

Suddenly, all of Bucky’s tension was back. He hadn’t had such a severe reaction to Winter being mentioned in _months_. Tony had thought he’d accepted the other’s presence in his body, once he figured out Winter wasn’t about to go on a homicidal killing spree.

“I thought you were okay with the baking,” Bucky rushed to say. “I’m so sorry. I’ll work on getting him to stop. He gets out of the floor even if ask JARVIS to lock the whole thing down so I’d honestly given up a bit but I’ll start doing it again. I’ll figure something out.”

He sounded panicked, which was not at all what Tony had intended.

“No, no!” he reassured. “I really don’t mind the baking. It’s fine. And Winter is _awesome_ at it. It’s the _volume_ that’s just a bit much. I don’t know what I did to make Winter think I’m some sort of starving waif he needed to feed, but I’m going to get _fat_ if this keeps up. Fat and in a sugar coma.”

Of all the possible reactions Bucky could have had, the one Tony would have expected the least was for him to blush beet red… It was a surprisingly good look on him. Tony caught himself wanting to make him do it again.

“He likes that it makes you happy.”

“What?” Tony asked, having been too distracted by Bucky’s delectable blush to actually really pay attention.

Of course, that only made Bucky blush harder as he was forced to explain in more detail.

“Winter,” he clarified. “You always looked so happy before when he brought you the baked goods and he really likes that. Making you happy.”

Realization slammed into Tony like a freight train.

“So, when I started giving it away…”

“He thought it wasn’t making you as happy anymore. He tried to compensate.”

It should have been creepy, probably, or at least not as endearing as it was. Tony found himself surprisingly… touched.

“That’s actually ridiculously adorable, and now I feel guilty for making him feel bad. Winter is a _world class assassin_ , Bucky! He should not be able to make me feel like I kicked a puppy!”

That seemed to break through Bucky’s embarrassment and he snorted in laughter.

“It’s your own fault for being so perfect we fell in love with you!”

There was a pregnant pause as they both realized what Bucky had just said.

“Shit,” the soldier cursed, expression stricken. “Forget I said that. I gotta go.”

And then he fled, leaving Tony alone in the gym trying to figure out what the Hell had just happened.

.

As usual, when Tony was confronted by emotions he couldn’t easily label and put in a box, he headed down to the workshop. That was where Winter found him several hours later. Instead of cookies, he came bearing a bowl of salad, complete with field greens, dried cranberries, and what looked like candied walnuts. Tony frowned at it.

“What is this?”

Winter stared at him with his Resting Murder Face. It had stopped having any effect on Tony a while ago, but he still thought the feathery pink apron took a lot of the bite out of it. Tony didn’t even know where Winter had _found_ the thing. Clint had probably bought it just for this purpose.

“Salad,” Winter said gruffly, like Tony couldn’t _see_ that.

“Why did you bring me a salad?”

“So you don’t get fat.”

Tony squinted up at him. He could swear Winter knew exactly what he was doing and faked half of his speech patterns for his own amusement. Tony just hadn’t been able to prove it yet.

“Should I expect salads instead of baked goods all the time now?”

Winter shrugged.

“I like baking more.”

Tony looked down at the salad again. It looked awesome, no doubt, but still. Salad.

“I like _eating_ your baking more,” he confessed.

Winter nodded like that was the most logical thing in the world. Tony supposed it was.

Then, completely out of the blue, “Bucky shouldn’t have left.”

The genius’ head snapped up to stare at him again.

“You mean from the gym?”

A short, curt nod from Winter.

“There was no need for him to leave. He was embarrassed, and ashamed, but he should not have been.”

Tony sighed and set the salad on his worktable. Apparently, they were having this conversation now.

“A lot of people would be embarrassed after accidentally confessing their feelings for someone _to_ that person.”

Winter’s Resting Murder Face got slightly more murdery, the only outward sign of his frustration.

“He should not have been,” the assassin insisted. “You love us, too.”

 _That_ brought Tony up short.

“Excuse me?” he asked, incredulous.

Winter just shrugged.

“You’re still going to eat the salad.”

Tony burst into laughter. How could he argue with logic like that?


End file.
